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Fred Mills: Random #vinylporn Musings Nos. 18a & 18b

Why listen to shitty-sounding streaming music on Spotify for free when you can pay for the privilege and have something to show for it?

BY FRED MILLS

This week, as June turned into July, in between the Health Care Follies revue, bleeding facelifts, and a preview of looming voter fraud/suppression tussles, we still received some happy #vinylporn news, that the Sony Music record pressing plant in Japan was getting its turbines cleaned up and dusted off in anticipation of cranking out the wax once again. Most of the media coverage, though welcome, was pretty matter of fact and superficial, to be honest, with reports simply pulling out a few lazy statistics about the contemporary “vinyl resurgence” (I officially proclaim that term to be a cliche now – if something has been “resurging” for more than 5 years, I think it’s officially an “ongoing trend”) and quoting some random hipster journalist. (Yes, NPR, I am available for comment. Call me.)

However,Britain’s The Guardian did a pretty decent job with their report “Records come round again: Sony to open vinyl factory in Japan” – check it out HERE – and also dig the photo of a Japanese pressing of Let It Be, since that is literally the only genuinely relevant, context-wise, photo I’ve spotted in all the Sony Japan coverage.

The one thing that all the reports overlooked, or at least could have mentioned as an intriguing and relevant sidelight, is that back in the day, Japanese pressings were considered the gold standard by many, if not most, collectors. After a certain point you could certainly get audiophile reissue pressings from Mobile Fidelity and a couple other Stateside labels catering to a niche market (typically jazz and classical), but Japanese releases still had a certain allure and cachet, both for their reissues and new releases – and, sometimes, for their exclusive nature.

For example, there was the stunning live-in-Japan Miles Davis release Agharta, and Santana’s classic live rec Moonflower, both of which I put considerable energy into tracking down. They weren’t cheap, either. A lot of folks probably forget that Cheap Trick’s Budokan album gained traction initially as a white-hot import-only release – that was the only way you could hear it. I would venture to say that folks prized Japanese pressings for their heavy-weight/virgin vinyl provenance (something that US labels abandoned early on – RCA and Dynaflex pressings, I’m lookin’ at YOU for making all that possible long before the oil shortage affected the record industry), the ongoing use of heavy-stock tip-on sleeves and poly-lined inner sleeves (ditto), and not-essential-but-still-cool extras like outer OBI strips and liner notes or lyrics not included in other countries’ pressings. Gee – it’s almost like in 2017, labels that really care about releasing a quality product with classic touches like 180gm and/or colored vinyl pressings and thick-stock gatefold sleeves, are taking their cues from the heyday of Japanese vinyl… you could even propose that Japan, often a pioneer in technological trends back in the day, pioneered the art of… wait for it… #vinylporn.

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As long as we are on the #vinylporn topic, I noticed this week that Atomic Disc in Oregon is having a sale on pressing records. I have no idea what the going rate is at other plants or what a “good rate” might be, but currently, 300 copies of an LP on black vinyl will cost you $1750, which comes out to only about $6 a platter. The price is only $3.20 per copy if you get 1000 copies. (Yeah, do that math quickly, and then think about that $29.98 list price major label LP you bought last week.) A download card included will cost an extra $100, and if you want colored wax (of course you do) it will be $2149.

As you might imagine, my punk band Bo Oswald & the Biohazard Boys and I plan to press our debut, Binky The Troll – a Rock Opera, on splatter vinyl. That bumps the cost of 300 copies up to $2689, but hey, we care about YOU, our fans, so no price is too great… see ya in the record bins.

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